Brown Formula Racing, which receives an average of $23,000 annually from the Undergraduate Finance Board, is set to lose this funding in fall 2026.
As the start of the semester approached, the Student Activities Office informed Brown’s Formula Racing Team, referred to as FSAE, that they would no longer be eligible to receive funding from both the UFB and the School of Engineering. This is due to SAO regulations that restrict student groups from holding dual recognition, according to Joie Forte, senior associate dean and director of student activities.
The SAO handbook states that “organizations can only be recognized by one entity.” Forte added that dual recognition creates “different expectations,” and “important risk measures may fall through the cracks based on the assumption that the other office is responsible for managing something.”
Forte wrote that she had been “made aware in the summer that FSAE was recognized by both the engineering department and UCS.”
Associate Professor of Engineering Daniel Harris, the club’s faculty advisor, wrote in an email to The Herald that he had received “conflicting information” from the SAO.
According to Harris, the SAO gave “multiple reasons” for the new funding structure while communicating with Brown FSAE, including the fact that the club operates over the summer.
Forte noted that UCS-recognized groups are not permitted to operate during the summer. “FSAE felt it was important that they operate year round which they would be able to do through departmental recognition,” she wrote.
FSAE member and former captain Rehaan Irani ’25.5 said this came as a “shock” to the group, which builds formula-style race cars to compete in national competitions. Funding the group receives from the UFB — which has totaled $83,636 since the 2017-18 academic year — goes toward the individual parts of the car, according to Jack Kolman ’26, one of the co-captains of Brown’s FSAE.
“I don’t think the same reasoning has been applied to other groups, as it has been to us,” Irani said in an interview with The Herald. Harris added that he is aware of other student groups who will continue to receive funding from both the SAO and the School of Engineering.
But FSAE is not the only club that has faced this decision, according to Forte.
“There have been other groups each semester that have been informed about the dual recognition process once we were made aware and have been asked to choose the recognition that works best for them,” Forte wrote. “We have handled each of these situations consistently.”
There are several other student organizations on campus that are funded both by academic departments and by the UCS — which is separate from dual recognition. But any student organization can receive funding from departments, so long as that funding is transferred to the student organization’s SAO account, Forte wrote. “Funding is not the concern,” she wrote.
Ethan Kim ’28, co-president of Brown Rocketry, said his club has received funding from both the School of Engineering and the UFB for as long as he has been a member.
Brown Rocketry received $1,770 in UFB funding for this 2025-26 academic year, according to UFB public records. Kim said that without funding from both entities, the club would not be able to take on its primary project of building a “high power rocket that’s over seven feet tall.”
